By Ruth Gidley
The precious statistic can help aid agencies convince a weary world there is a crisis in the jungles of Africa or forgotten corners of Iraq -- where death comes from hunger and disease related to war as well as from war itself.
Its latest survey in the central African state found 45,000 people a month were dying from war-related hunger and disease, even though the conflict there had ended officially in 2003.
"It was really difficult to reach some places...We chartered airplanes and boats. We hired motorbikes," Brennan said.
Other IRC teams visited communities living next to rubbish dumps the size of two-storey houses, and were given piggyback rides across open sewers to ask their questions about births and deaths.
The effort to provide scientifically grounded death tolls -- calculating the death rate and comparing it to the regional norm -- has boosted donations to help Congo recover from a conflict that sucked in seven nations and enveloped the region.
The Congo surveys haven't been particularly controversial, but researchers trying to pin down a death toll for Iraq know their findings will come under intense scrutiny.
The British-based Web site - set up in 2003 before the start of the U.S.-led invasion - seeks to commemorate those who have died with entries that give the person's name whenever possible.
While Iraq Body Count aims to provide an irrefutable minimum toll -- currently 81,000 to 88,000 -- others use methods more like IRC's Congo survey to extrapolate the full number of casualties.
A team from Johns Hopkins University in the United States estimated as many as 654,000 deaths beyond the norm in Iraq during the same period.
ORB calculated its number using Iraq's last census in 1997 which documented 4.05 million households.
The IRC reports highlight the fact hunger and disease caused by a conflict often kill more people than the violence itself.
The IRC findings from Congo appear to mirror experiences in Angola, Liberia, Sierra Leone; all still struggling to recover from brutal conflicts.
Feared militias, government soldiers and renegade tribal fighters still prey on civilians and keep them from crops, safe water and health centres in the volatile east of the country.
"People aren't dying dramatically," Brennan said. "They're dying quietly and anonymously ... In the eyes of Western powers, Congo doesn't represent major political or economic interest."
(For more information on humanitarian issues visit www.alertnet.org)
